Spacey Jane’s pandemic story starts like that of countless other bands—new momentum stunted by an unexpected and overwhelming international tragedy. For years, they’d sculpted a few dozen songs of sharp guitar jangles and bounding rhythms, the radiance offset by Caleb Harper’s entirely tuneful descriptions of his struggles. “There’s this expectation that your late teens and early 20s are the golden years, the best time,” he says. “But the reality is that it’s not some great event, if you look at the difficulty of the world right now.” Australia agreed: Sunlight, Spacey Jane’s debut, catapulted toward the top of the charts, becoming ubiquitous during that first summer of lockdown. “Booster Seat,” a sleepy but sullen gem about watching your friends succeed from the sideline, became a timely anthem for an island ostracized by lockdown, grabbing the No. 2 slot on the year-end triple j chart. These are rarified feats for a self-managed band and a testament to their songs’ delightful tension between fun and frustration, excitement and ennui. They couldn’t, however, leave Australia. Having given up his place for impending tours, Harper moved in with his father and retreated to a bedroom with an acoustic guitar, trying to suss out what kind of advice he might offer to other kids stuck between stations as he once had been and somehow still was. The songs that emerged hinged on the same vulnerability and candor that defined Sunlight—the depressed college kid studying cigarettes and booze to distract himself from tedium on “Sitting Up,” the mindless tasks used to still post-breakup sadness on “Clean My Car,” the endless apprehension of impostor syndrome on “Hardlight.” These songs sported a new sense of reassurance, though; they felt like detailed notes to Harper’s past remembered selves, reminders that he had made it through despair to find his place. You might, too.
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